Edward Stillingfleet, who has claimed our attention both as a healer and a stirrer up of strife, although not a doctrinal controversialist, demands some notice as a writer on Christian evidences. His broad and moderate churchmanship at the period of the Restoration, and his sympathy also at that time with the Latitudinarian Divines of Cambridge,—where he was educated and obtained a Fellowship at St. John’s in 1653,—entitle him to a place amongst them in the early part of his life.[481] It was in the year 1662, that he published his “Origines Sacræ; or Rational Account of the Christian Faith, as to the Truth and Divine Authority of the Scripture.” His learning, acuteness, logical ability, and lawyer-like habit of thought eminently fitted him for controversy, and these talents are signally displayed in the book now mentioned. The first part is occupied with an exposure of the obscurity, defect, and uncertainty of heathen histories, and of heathen chronology. In the treatment of this subject, he so completely undermines the credibility of all ancient history, except what is in Scripture, that he unwittingly precludes the proper use of the former in certain instances as a corroboration of the latter. He does not with thorough care distinguish between insufficiency and a complete want of authority. In the second book, he dwells on the knowledge, fidelity, and integrity of Moses; and upon the proofs of a Divine inspiration of the prophets from the fulfilment of their prophecies; but in this part of his work, he does not so much anticipate the details of the modern argument, as unfold the principles upon which he conceived the argument should rest. The evidence from miracles is also exhibited. The third book, to which the title of Origines particularly points, treats of the being of God, and the origin of the universe,—of evil—of the nations of the earth—and of the Heathen Mythology. In connection with the origin of nations, he vindicates the Scripture history of the Deluge, and falls into harmony with modern geologists, by confessing that he sees no necessity from Scripture, to assert, that the flood spread itself over the whole surface of the earth.[482]
Before proceeding further with the current of theological opinion, let me pause for a moment to mention the names of men who, in the service of Biblical learning, may perhaps be justly classed with the Divines now under review. Lightfoot, the Erastian, published, between 1644 and 1664, a Harmony of the Gospels, a Commentary upon the Acts, and Notes upon St. Paul’s Epistles to the Romans and Corinthians, besides Horæ Hebraicæ, et Talmudicæ, and other Exercitations of a similar kind. All his books exhibit Rabbinical lore applied to the elucidation of the Holy Scriptures; and he is not only the first of our English Divines to break up new ground decidedly and extensively in this field, but he actually tills the soil to such a degree, that none of his successors in the same path of industry are equal to this master-workman. Besides his own volumes, he has contributed to the interests of Biblical scholarship, by largely assisting Walton in his Polyglott, and Poole in his Synopsis.
Simon Patrick—numbered by Burnet among the Latitudinarians—wrote Commentaries upon the Old Testament, as far as the Book of Esther,—these were published between the years 1694 and 1705,—but at an earlier date, between 1678 and 1681, he wrote Paraphrases of Job and the Psalms, of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Solomon. He united reverence with learning, and brevity with accuracy; and avoiding the method of citing a number of opinions, which only perplex the reader, he gives his own in a style which is clear, and with arguments which are forcible.[483]
There is another person entitled to honourable mention, which perhaps may be as fittingly introduced here as anywhere: for, though he cannot be identified with the Latitudinarian school, neither can he in any proper sense be pronounced either Anglican or Puritan. Dr. James Ussher occupies a niche of his own in the temple of theological literature. His broad sympathies seem to fix his place at least near to those scholars who have just been described. As to time, his publications take their place between the beginning of the works of Lightfoot and the beginning of the works of Patrick. Ussher differed from them both. He was far superior to the last in learning; but I should infer, from what is said of him, that in some respects—certainly in the Rabbinical department of study—he was inferior to Lightfoot as a Biblical critic. In the learning which relates to sacred chronology he had no rival.
CAMBRIDGE.—SCIENCE.
At the close of this chapter, in which so much has been said respecting the free thought of the Cambridge school, and just as we are on the point of noticing its wider developments, I would seize the opportunity of saying a few words in relation to views of science entertained by more advanced theological inquirers. Aristotle remained a favourite philosophical teacher with the supporters of old-fashioned orthodoxy. The “new learning,” as the investigation of physical phenomena after the Baconian method, came to be termed, inspired an immense degree of suspicion in the minds of a large number of clergymen, who fancied they could detect in it tendencies to Popery, or Socinianism,—they scarcely knew which; and the infant Royal Society, then beginning “to knock at the door where truth was to be found, although it was left for Newton to force it open,”[484] expressed a good deal of indignation on account of its supposed arrogance. It received such treatment as falls to the lot of a pert and conceited child, and old people shook their heads as they prognosticated the end of such folly after a little experience. Gunning, Bishop of Ely, Barlow, Bishop of Lincoln, and South, when orator at the University of Oxford, denounced these new studies as most mischievous; and Henry Stubbe, an intense admirer of Aristotle, raved against the scientific associates with a violence which was perfectly absurd.[485] That jealousy of science, which is not yet extinguished, then burnt with greater fury than it does now; and the Divines who united the inductive study of nature with the more immediate duties of their profession, had to sustain the brunt of a fierce battle. Seth Ward, Bishop of Salisbury, and Wilkins, Bishop of Chester, whilst theologically at variance, were scientifically in unison, and occupied the front rank in the clerical army on the side of intellectual advancement. But the person most zealous and laborious in the defence of the new philosophy was Joseph Glanvill, Rector of Bath, and Chaplain in Ordinary to Charles II., a writer of great ability, who had at his command a racy vigorous English style. It is amusing to find him employing the doctrine of a pre-existence of souls as the key to unlock the grand mysteries of Providence, and defending the possibility and real existence of witches and apparitions; still more amusing to be told by him that Adam needed neither spectacles nor telescope, for his naked eyes saw as much of the celestial world as we can discover with all the advantages of art.[486] Nevertheless the tone of his philosophy on the whole was decidedly sceptical; more so than Descartes, more so than Malebranche.
CAMBRIDGE.—SCIENCE.
Glanvill, who was a Fellow of the Royal Society, and acted as its Secretary, described and vindicated its character and proceedings, as a noble institution, vouchsafed to the modern world for the communication and increase of knowledge, according to the pregnant suggestion of Lord Bacon, that many heads and hands should unite in making and recording scientific observations, thus gathering up the facts which lie scattered in “the vast champaign of nature,” and bringing them into a common store.[487] But a notice of the way in which Glanvill defended the religious temper and tendencies of the experimental philosophy is more to our purpose; and I may, therefore, state that he executed his task in an ingenious and lively performance which is well worth the attention of certain people in the present day. He shows that God is to be praised in all His works—that His works are to be studied by those that would praise Him for them—that the study of nature in relation to God is very serviceable to religion—and that the ministers and professors of religion ought not to discourage, but promote the knowledge of the ways and works of its Author. He not only points out the connection between science and natural religion, but proves how true philosophy may be a friend of revelation, since it is a maxim of reason, that whatsoever God saith is to be believed, though we cannot apprehend the manner of it or tell how the thing should be.[488] No heterodoxy lurked under the advocacy of this scientific Divine, for he applied his principle to the Trinity and Incarnation, as being defensible on the same grounds as the existence of matter and motion. He moves nearer to the controversies of our own time, and indeed takes up a position in the midst of existing strifes, when he challenges the imputation, that philosophy teaches doctrines contrary to the Word of God. He meets it by saying, philosophy teaches many things which are not revealed in Scripture, for the design of Scripture is to teach religion, not science; no tenet ought to be exploded because some statements in the Divine oracles seem not to comport with it, natural objects being popularly described in the Old Testament; and the free experimental philosophy which the author pursued, and undertook to recommend, ventured, he said, on no peremptory and dogmatical assertions opposed to Divine authority, but confined itself to probabilities, where religion and the Scriptures are not at all concerned.[489] In many of his remarks, Glanvill anticipates the line of defence adopted by modern religious philosophers; and whilst he evinces a freedom of inquiry into natural phenomena which proves that he had burst the trammels of ancient prejudices, he also indicates a profound reverence for the Bible, and never allows his scepticism to utter a syllable inconsistent with belief in Divine revelation. I may add, that he published a discourse upon the agreement between reason and religion, against infidelity, scepticism, and fanaticisms of all sorts. It is apparent, from what he says, that he had no sympathy with Puritanism, but he had a great respect for Richard Baxter.
CHAPTER XVI.
The term Latitudinarian, both as a term of praise and a term of reproach, intended by friends to signify that a man was liberal, intended by enemies to denote that he was heterodox, came to be applied to thinkers holding very different opinions. Amongst the Divines, often placed under the generic denomination, very considerable diversities of sentiment existed. Indeed, the name is so loosely used as to be given to some persons whose orthodoxy is above all just suspicion—to others not only verging upon but deeply involved in considerable error. When we examine the essence of Latitudinarianism, and find that it consisted in the elevation of morals above dogmas, in the assertion of charity against bigotry, in abstinence from a curious prying into mysteries, yet in the culture of a spirit of free investigation, we see that there might be lying concealed under much which is truly excellent, elements of a different description. Scepticism might nestle under all this virtue, and all this tolerance—under this love of what is reasonable, and this habit of liberal inquiry. Faith, in that which is most precious, might live in amicable alliance with the distinctive Latitudinarian temper, or scepticism might secretly nestle beneath its wings.